How I've been looking at it lately is that the issue is in the fact that the hospitals profit when you are sick rather than profit when you are well, and not simply the fact that the hospitals can profit from your care. A possibility that I've heard thrown around is running a hospital on a subscription service. That way the hospital will profit when you are not in it. Unfortunately, this is not without it's issues.
Isn't that what insurance is? Also wouldn't it incentivize hospitals to kick you out even before you have healed?
The only solution is a state owned universal Healthcare system.
Isn't that what insurance is?
Currently, I'm not big on insurance. Like loans, it separates the consumer from the product. A consumer's reluctance to directly pay for a product is what drives down prices.
Also wouldn't it incentivize hospitals to kick you out even before you have healed?
Yeah, like I said, it's not without its issues. Perhaps, when then patient is admitted to the hospital, a contract is simultaneously created which is an agreement between the hospital and patient that they will go through the full treatment required to help them. If the patient is removed prematurely, then the patient can file a lawsuit against the hospital for breach of contract.
That's why healthcare should fundamentally be done as a public service as opposed to for profit.
In my country we actually do that. Everyone subscribes. An added benefit is that the companies that the sick people work in get higher profit because they get healthy workers back who don't spend all their time thinking about their crippling debt.
That's kind of how HMOs like Kaiser work. They are really good at dealing with issues that could get severe. But things that are not going to turn into something that will cost them money they don't really do a good job at, such as mental health care. Diagnosing you with anxiety or ADHD and prescribing you drugs for it just costs them money, so if they can make it super hard for you to get the diagnosis then they don't have to spend it. It's not really something that will eventually land you in an expensive hospital stay or long term PT.
Welcome to Ontario. In Ontario, if you qualify, your healthcare is mostly paid for by OHIP (other than medication, glasses, hearing aides, and dental.) It works like this.
OHIP sets the price of treatments, doctors and hospitals do the treatments and then get paid the predetermined amount. BUT doctors run their own practice and hospitals are private businesses that need to turn a profit in order to keep the lights on and continue to offer healthcare. So as the cost of everything goes up the profit margins go down and cuts have to be made. Nurses are paid less, emergency rooms are closed and there aren't enough doctors to go around.
No part of healthcare should be for profit.
No part of healthcare should be for profit.
Including teeth and eyecare, neither of which should be considered luxuries you can go without.
Switzerland privatized all the hospitals except maybe a few. The cost of healthcare skyrocketed after that.
Nowadays, people can't pay for them private and mandatory healthcare insurance as it became too expensive putting them in financial trouble.
